[175.1] MOZART IN DA HOUSE

No doubt Glyndebourne will gain ridicule, respect, incredulity and indifference in roughly equal proportions for their hip-hop version of Mozart's Cosi Fan Tutte, which plays tonight in Lewes, UK, and then travels to Helsinki, Finland, and Tallinn, Estonia, in June 2006. Whatever the final critical judgement (and bear in mind that worthy 'youth opera' Zoe was praised in performance and then panned on Channel 4) I think this adventuresome idea deserves praise for its intentions and concept. After all, RSC have been rapping Shakespeare for years -- and in a narrowcast, broadband culture where artforms are readily stereotyped and ghettoised, it's good to have hip-hop and opera out, proud and phat in School 4 Lovers. Or should that be "Schl4lvrs"?

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